What I Learnt from The LEGO Movie

(Daddy muses)

If you have read my previous post on our new Pioneer home entertainment system, you will know that we would rather choose to watch movies at home than in cinemas nowadays, especially since the cost of going to the cinemas adds up a fair bit for a family of five.

But there will always be exceptions to the rule.

And The LEGO Movie is one of them. Let's face it, the boys and I are LEGO nerds and there was absolutely no chance of us having to wait a few months for the DVD - we are so going to get it when it comes out by the way, but that's another story - so there was only always going to be one conclusion: we caught the movie at the earliest timing we could.

The story is kept remarkably simple and easy to understand, even for younger children. Emmet is a construction figurine who follows all the Lego rules and accidentally gets mistaken for the legendary Master Builder of LEGO folklore. A group of Master Builder rebels, led by Wyldstyle and her narcissistic boyfriend Batman, want Emmet to fulfill the prophecy and use the 'piece of resistance to thwart the evil and control freak President Business' plan of gluing all the LEGO bricks together because he can't stand LEGO bricks built not according to instructions.

This blog post is not meant to be a review but if I were to sum up the movie in one word, it will have to be 'AWESOME'!

The purpose of this post though, is about the valuable parenting lessons that I have learnt for The LEGO Movie. And trust me, the more I thought about the movie after I watched it, the more I was blown away by the messages it carried.

I will try my best to not reveal any spoilers but just in case you are intending to catch the movie, DO NOT proceed any further if you do not want to be... erm, spoiled by the spoilers.

Still want to continue? Okay, read on.

The primary power of storytelling is to teach lessons, and The LEGO Movie manages that effectively. But the one thing which I totally did not expect from the movie was how heartfelt it actually is, particularly towards the end. For me, the true genius of the movie comes in recognizing that parents are the ones taking their kids to see it.

So I was like sitting there, laughing and guffawing when suddenly, there is a twist in the plot - a fabulous game changer that re-focuses the film on the parents. And wham, I got all emotional. Because I admit, the parenting messages that came towards the end of the movie? Guilty as charged.

As much as we parents want to exercise control over our children and make them follow every instruction - much like how President Business wants it - we run the risk of stifling our children's creativity and freewill in the long run.

But what if they are as wildly creative as the Master Builders? As we found out, they are not so perfect either. Though creative, they lack cooperative skills which actually hindered their collective effort to save themselves and everyone else. Which also goes to show that one cannot be truly great until you understand how your contributions can fit into the lives of others.

So yes, it is a movie about mini-figures and blocks and crazy car chases and explosions and creativity, but it’s also about self-worth, childhood and the beauty of parent-child connections.

Oh and one last thing - THAT song. I thought that nothing in the world would ever replace Frozen's 'Let it Go' in my home's music playlist but I was dead wrong. The super catchy 'Everything Is Awesome' is now the official soundtrack of my household. In an awesome kind of way, of course.